Li Qiang

Li Qiang: The Negative Sent to Future is a collection of photographic works by artist Li Qiang, taken between the 1980s and 2020s. It includes three series: Northern Homeland, Distant Memories, and City Encounter. Li Qiang’s photographs are predominantly black and white, capturing portraits, cityscapes, rural society, and plateau landscapes against specific cultural and historical backdrops. In his photographic language, Li Qiang maintains an existentialist style: profound yet not oppressive, as if the subjects themselves are speaking, seemingly saying everything, yet saying nothing at all. The Northern Homeland series takes us back to the countryside and wilderness of Northwest China, back to the existential realm of solitary wandering in the wilderness; the Distant Memories series records life under the pure sky of the Southwest Plateau, mostly indistinct silhouettes, as if embraced by the heavens while maintaining an impressionistic distance from them; while the City Encounter series transforms the commonplace things of the city into fresh experiences for the soul, as if the reader themselves has just arrived from the distant countryside, only having caught a fleeting glimpse of the dazzling lights of the big city. The three themes intertwine, leading readers back and forth between the city of real life and the distant spiritual homeland.